Human impacts on the stream-groundwater exchange zone

Active exchanges of water and dissolved material between the stream and groundwater in many porous sand- and gravel-bed rivers create a dynamic ecotone called the hyporheic zone. Because it lies between two heavily exploited freshwater resources—rivers and groundwater—the hyporheic zone is vulnerable to impacts coming to it through both of these habitats. This review focuses on the direct and indirect effects of human activity on ecosystem functions of the hyporheic zone. River regulation, mining, agriculture, urban, and industrial activities all have the potential to impair interstitial bacterial and invertebrate biota and disrupt the hydrological connections between the hyporheic zone and stream, groundwater, riparian, and floodplain ecosystems. Until recently, our scientific ignorance of hyporheic processes has perhaps excused the inclusion of this ecotone in river management policy. However, this no longer is the case as we become increasingly aware of the central role that the hyporheic zone plays in the maintenance of water quality and as a habitat and refuge for fauna. To fully understand the impacts of human activity on the hyporheic zone, river managers need to work with scientists to conduct long-term studies over large stretches of river. River rehabilitation and protection strategies need to prevent the degradation of linkages between the hyporheic zone and surrounding habitats while ensuring that it remains isolated from toxicants. Strategies that prevent anthropogenic restriction of exchanges may include the periodic release of environmental flows to flush silt and reoxygenate sediments, maintenance of riparian buffers, effective land use practices, and suitable groundwater and surface water extraction policies.     

Quantitative Assessment of Agricultural Runoff and Soil Erosion Using Mathematical Modeling: Applications in the Mediterranean Region

Three mathematical models, the runoff curve number equation, the universal soil loss equation, and the mass response functions, were evaluated for predicting nonpoint source nutrient loading from agricultural watersheds of the Mediterranean region. These methodologies were applied to a catchment, the gulf of Gera Basin, that is a typical terrestrial ecosystem of the islands of the Aegean archipelago. The calibration of the model parameters was based on data from experimental plots from which edge-of-field losses of sediment, water runoff, and nutrients were measured. Special emphasis was given to the transport of dissolved and solid-phase nutrients from their sources in the farmers' fields to the outlet of the watershed in order to estimate respective attenuation rates. It was found that nonpoint nutrient loading due to surface losses was high during winter, the contribution being between 50% and 80% of the total annual nutrient losses from the terrestrial ecosystem. The good fit between simulated and experimental data supports the view that these modeling procedures should be considered as reliable and effective methodological tools in Mediterranean areas for evaluating potential control measures, such as management practices for soil and water conservation and changes in land uses, aimed at diminishing soil loss and nutrient delivery to surface waters. Furthermore, the modifications of the general mathematical formulations and the experimental values of the model parameters provided by the study can be used in further application of these methodologies in watersheds with similar characteristics.     

Integrated Resource Management: Moving from Rhetoric to Practice in Australian Agriculture

/ Implementing the concept of sustainability through integrated approaches to natural resource management poses enormous challenges for both the rural communities and government agencies concerned. This paper reviews the underlying rhetoric of sustainable agricultural systems and the integrated resource management paradigm and identifies some of the challenges being experienced in translating this rhetoric into practice. A relatively recently implemented community-based integrated catchment management (ICM) process in a rural community in northeast Australia is examined in terms of some of the lessons learned that may be relevant to other similar integrated resource management (IRM) processes. It reveals a pragmatic, opportunistic, and evolving implementation process based on adaptive learning rather than a more traditional "rational" planning approach. Some essential characteristics of a community-based IRM process are identified, including fostering communication; providing a structure that fosters cooperation and facilities coordination among community, industry, and government agencies; the integration of IRM principles into local government planning schemes; and an emergent strategic approach to IRM program implementation. We conclude by identifying some essential characteristics of an IRM process that can assist a community to adapt to, and manage change for, sustainable resource use.     

我国农业自然灾害与农业政策性保险

在详细分析了我国当前主要农业自然灾害情况的基础上,探讨了通过建立农业政策性保险来应对自然灾害风险的必要性以及我国农业保险目前面临的问题,提出了加大政府支持力度、加快农业保险立法、提高保险意识、加强保险人才培养等方面的政策建议。     

Impacts of agri-environmental policy on land use and nitrogen leaching in Finland

Agri-environmental policies are challenging to be evaluated since they are often implemented in combination with other policies and regulations affecting agriculture. Also input and output markets affect agriculture. We provide impact assessment of agri-environmental scheme implemented in Finland 2007–2013 based on integrated economic and hydrological modelling and counterfactual scenarios. Development of crop specific fertilisation and land use changes, simulated using a multi-regional economic sector model, is included in a nutrient leaching model implemented in a typical agricultural region. Our results on agricultural production, land use, and nitrogen leaching show that the agri-environmental policy successfully mitigates nutrient leaching in intensive production regions but some mitigation potential is lost in less intensive regions.     

Principles and processes for effecting change in environmental management in New Zealand

In New Zealand environmental management is essentially the responsibility of land managers. Management decisions affect both production/productivity and the environment. However, responsibility for ensuring positive environmental outcomes falls on both local (Regional) and Central Government, and both they and international agencies such as the OECD would wish to monitor and report on changes. In terms of policy, strong links have been established via Central and Regional Government to land managers. Consumers in the market place are also, increasingly, requiring responsibility for positive environmental outcomes of those who purchase and process primary products. Strong links for responsibility have been established between our international markets and processing businesses and there is a noticeable strengthening of the links from the processors to the land manager/producer. In New Zealand a range of initiatives has been developed and implemented over recent times, whereby land managers are taking increasing responsibility for accounting for the environmental outcomes of their production activities. The range covers the spectrum from voluntary to compulsory (e.g., in order to meet market requirements) and from those initiated by customers to processor and/or producer initiatives. This paper follows the evolution of the principles that drove the predominant activities of the period and the processes that initiated the changes in environmental management. As the focus of agriculturalists changed from pioneering in a new world, to establishing a production base, to economic reality, and finally to environmental responsibility, the processes of extension adapted to meet the new challenge.     

Assessment of the Water Quality and Ecosystem Health of the Great Barrier Reef (Australia): Conceptual Models

Run-off containing increased concentrations of sediment, nutrients, and pesticides from land-based anthropogenic activities is a significant influence on water quality and the ecologic conditions of nearshore areas of the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area, Australia. The potential and actual impacts of increased pollutant concentrations range from bioaccumulation of contaminants and decreased photosynthetic capacity to major shifts in community structure and health of mangrove, coral reef, and seagrass ecosystems. A detailed conceptual model underpins and illustrates the links between the main anthropogenic pressures or threats (dry-land cattle grazing and intensive sugar cane cropping) and the production of key contaminants or stressors of Great Barrier Reef water quality. The conceptual model also includes longer-term threats to Great Barrier Reef water quality and ecosystem health, such as global climate change, that will potentially confound direct model interrelationships. The model recognises that system-specific attributes, such as monsoonal wind direction, rainfall intensity, and flood plume residence times, will act as system filters to modify the effects of any water-quality system stressor. The model also summarises key ecosystem responses in ecosystem health that can be monitored through indicators at catchment, riverine, and marine scales. Selected indicators include riverine and marine water quality, inshore coral reef and seagrass status, and biota pollutant burdens. These indicators have been adopted as components of a long-term monitoring program to enable assessment of the effectiveness of change in catchment-management practices in improving Great Barrier Reef (and adjacent catchment) water quality under the Queensland and Australian Governments’ Reef Water Quality Protection Plan.     

土地集约利用程度对华北潮土农田土壤微生物群落丰度和死生物物质积累的影响

土壤微生物决定着土壤生态系统的养分周转状况,其死生物物质在土壤有机碳(SOC)积累中发挥关键作用.然而,目前缺乏对土壤微生物群落丰度及其死生物物质如何响应农业土地集约利用程度调整的了解.为弥补这一知识缺口,基于土地集约化利用程度,设置小麦-玉米周年轮作(CC)、临时草地与小麦种植交替(TG)和多年生草地(PG)这3个处理开展长期定位试验,采用基于数字PCR和微生物标志物氨基糖的检测技术,以探究农业土地集约利用程度调整对土壤细菌和真菌数量,以及细菌、真菌和总微生物死生物物质C积累及其对土壤SOC封存贡献的影响,进一步明确驱动细菌、真菌和总微生物死生物物质C积累的关键因子.结果表明,与土壤细菌群落丰度相比,真菌群落丰度受到农业土地集约利用程度调整的强烈影响,随土地集约利用程度的降低而增加.在3种土地集约利用程度处理下,土壤总微生物死生物物质C均主导SOC积累,对SOC的贡献率分别达到52.78%、 58.36%和68.87%,呈现随土地集约利用程度降低而升高的趋势;真菌死生物物质C占总微生物死生物物质C的比例均大于80%,说明其对总微生物死生物物质C的绝对主导地位,且受土地集约利用程度降低...     

我国农业面源污染的控制与管理研究

主要通过我国污染源普查和2013年环境公报介绍了我国农业面源污染的现状,并从土壤侵蚀、农业化肥及农药、畜禽粪尿污染、农村生活污水和固体废弃物垃圾、大气干湿沉降、航运污染等方面介绍了我国污染源农业面源污染的成因,结合对土地利用方式、农业活动和田间管理、畜禽粪便及垃圾污染、社会经济因素等农业面源污染的影响因素的分析,分别从技术措施、法律措施和经济措施3方面入手提出了我国面源污染的控制和管理措施。     

The legacy of large dams in the United States

The sustainability of large dams has been questioned on several grounds. One aspect that has been less explored is that the development of dams and reservoirs often enables agricultural expansion and urban growth, which in turn increase water consumption. As such, dam development influences, while being influenced by, the spatial and temporal distribution of both supply and demand of water resources. In this paper, we explore the interplay between large dams, patterns of population growth and agricultural expansion in the United States over the past two centuries. Based on a large-scale analysis of spatial and temporal trends, we identify three distinct phases, in which different processes dominated the interplay. Then, we focus on agricultural water use in the Southwest region (Arizona, California and Nevada) and explore chicken-and-egg dynamics where water supply partly meets and partly fuels water demand. Lastly, we show that the legacy of dams in the United States consists of a lock-in condition characterized by high levels of water consumption, especially in the Southwest, which leads to severe water crises and groundwater overexploitation when droughts occur.